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Hung jury: Mistrial declared in cell-phone assault case
By KEVIN HOFFMANN The Kansas City
A Jackson County Circuit Court judge declared a mistrial this afternoon in the case of a man accused of shoving a cell phone into his ex-girlfriend?s throat.
Judge Michael W. Manners accepted the jury?s conclusion that it would be unable to reach a verdict in the case of Marlon Brando Gill, 24. That ruling ended roughly seven hours of deliberations spanning two days in the county?s Independence courthouse annex.
Prosecutors said they expected to retry the case. Gill, who has been jailed since December on $100,000 cash bond, will remain there for the time being.
Members of the jury said this afternoon that the final deadlock was 8-4 in favor of acquittal. While there were concerns about his testimony, they said, inconsistencies created enough reasonable doubt to preclude a verdict of guilty.
Earlier today, they had twice returned to court to report being deadlocked; twice, Manners ordered them back to work.
Today?s deliberations began at 9 a.m. A little more than half an hour later, jurors broke to put a question to Manners: ?We are unable to arrive at a unanimous decision. What do we do now??
He instructed them to return to the jury room and to make every attempt to reach a unanimous verdict. They returned to that task at 9:45 a.m.
After another hour of wrangling, jurors reported that they were still split, without indicating whether they were leaning toward a finding of guilt or acquittal. Manners told them that it was too soon to declare them deadlocked. He sent them back into the jury room and told them to expect to work through lunch.
Just after lunch, though, jurors indicated that there was no hope of breaking the deadlock. Manners dismissed them shortly afterward.
Gill was accused of forcing the cell phone into the mouth of Melinda Abell in the early hours of Dec. 23 while the two argued in a car.
During five-day trial, the 25-year-old Abell testified that she had been drinking throughout the evening and had no recollection of how the phone ended up lodged in her throat. Gill says she tried to swallow it to prevent him from finding out whom she had been calling that night.
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